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Coats Coats Coats! (Or, Le Fantasy Suite)

Y’all, let me start by saying that I absolutely dreaded sitting through three hours of Vile Viall’s quest for Twue Wuv. I might have bailed on this whole enterprise were it not for good friends, some delicious chili and half a bottle of red wine. In an effort to process the whole experience without getting overwhelming, I’m going to break up the recap and separate the final fantasy suite hour from the women tell all. TBH even thinking about this whole thing again makes me wish I had the other half of that bottle to pour down my gullet right this second…. Let’s get this over with, shall we?

“Do it or do not do it – you will regret both.”1 Before I dive in, I have to note that Nick gets credit for sending Corinne home early instead of waiting for after the Fantasy Suite. I say this about as begrudgingly as I’ve ever said anything, because Nick for sure only reigned himself in because of the shit he gave Andi for sleeping with him and then sending him home. But if you know for sure you’re not going to end up with someone, then NOT having sex with them and subsequently humiliating them on national TV is the right thing to do, so…. props, Nick. Especially because he used to give Corinne the same slobbery stare a Labrador gives its dinner bowl.

This line of discussion brings us to….

Raven. Did they? Didn’t they? I will posit that they did not, given the absence of dissatisfaction on Raven’s part (SICK BURN!) plus the lack of any morning-after body-draping. Look, the thing is, if I were Nick I would have been terrified after last week’s big reveals. First because of performance anxiety, but also because if he’s not sure who the final rose is going to, having sex with Raven and then not picking her veers into hypocritical asshole territory… and we know that coming off as The Good Guy is Nick’s #1 priority, which is why I suspect that he once more reigned in his sex-monster tendencies and showed some restraint. This is also why I suspect that he’s going to ask Our Lady of Sadness Vanessa to be his bride… but more on that later.

THAT SAID, I want to give a big pile of high-fives to the ABC editing department, because Raven’s montage was a Bachelor-in-Paradise level DELIGHT. If Raven and Corinne don’t get their own show where they are roommates having adventures in the big city then it’s time for a shakeup in the ABC development department.

Rachel. We all knew this would happen even before the big ABC spoiler, right? The writing has been on the wall for awhile, and the wall says, “OMG NICK STAHP.”

The only thing Nick likes more than talking about how much he likes strong/independent women is running away from them. Rachel does not appear to be approaching the quest for Twue Wuv from a place of desperation/vulnerability and does not need Nick to affirm that she is worthy of love. So of course he pulled a roadrunner as soon as things got intimate… i.e., as soon as he pressured her into telling him she loved him and then slept with her. Blarg. Nick is so gross. As is demonstrated by his weird thing for giving women inner-thigh massages. All the Dr. Bronner’s in the world is not enough to scrub that imagine from my brain– or the obnoxiously loud smooching given to us by ABC’s sound mixing team. Ugggggh.

On a side note, Rachel is insanely photogenic. It just emphasizes Nick’s Mr. Tumnus-like qualities. I didn’t even hate her crop-top-under-chunky-cardigan look, even though WTF IT IS WINTER GIRL!

Anyway, Rachel, you are free! Congratulations! You may now go have fun being the Bachelorette, we can’t wait to watch you with some hopefully less-douchey dudes.

Nick’s Walk of Shame. Do they usually show the Bachelor/ette leaving the fantasy suite and I just haven’t noticed? It’s so gross to see Nick walking away with his overnight bag like a wandering sex journeyman. You can almost see him thinking “I dunn good.” Shudder. IDK why it took this particular footage to make me process how icky and bizarre the fantasy-suite construct is but this was really visceral.

Vanessa. Look, I don’t even want to talk about Vanessa anymore. I don’t know what universe she is in but she still has no idea she’s on the Bachelor…. Insecurity is just not a good look on her. Her comment that she “thinks she can do anything” when Nick says she can was just so sad and telling about how eager she is to project onto the human equivalent of a blank slate. When she loosens up a little bit and reminds us that there’s a human being inside there, she’s palatable! (I did like talking about chopping Nick up and feeding him to the reindeer).

Also, their horrible/awkward conversation in the yurt/hut thing– I mean, it’s good to get on the same page about your relationship… but that particular conversational tone never really portends well. And her “core value” is having lunch with her family? And Nick thinks that might make them “too similar?” What is going on here, please tell me that was the result of weird editing.

Last but not least, I was worried about them the entire time they were running back and forth between the sauna and the cold pool. Frostbite is no joke, people!

Nickless Lagniappe. I like to think about Nick as little as possible, and yet I am enjoying his season tremendously. A few observations from this episode–

So much good winter-wear! My goodness, the product placement this episode was both blatant (anyone else notice that the tag on Nick’s coat was the star of the show?) and on point.

So much bad formalwear! I mean, Rachel’s rose ceremony dress was nice (especially the back) but the bling was SO Dallas. Raven is so cute, she needs to stop styling herself like a Real Housewife of a Vampire Coven. Vanessa…. thinks she is in some kind of Russian novel? IDK and I don’t care.

Rachel also thinks Finland looks like Narnia!

I have cross country skied many a time in the Frozen North and it has gone about as well for me as it did for Rachel. It has taken me awhile to accept that pigeon toed people should maybe just forego skiing…. I’m kind of like a fainting goat, but on ice.

Ok well, that’s the best I can do for fantasy suites part II. I’m going to take a short break and then will tackle women tell all…. In the meantime everyone keep your tootsies warm!

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1. Yep. That’s a Kierkegaard quote. I wanted to prove to you guys that I’m smarter than my Bachelor love would imply, but if I’m being honest I just googled “quotes about regret” and picked the fanciest one. ↩